


Stand By Me

by abelrunner



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Zombie Apocalypse, Canon-Typical Violence, Fluff and Angst, Gore, Hand Jobs, M/M, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Pre-Serum Steve Rogers
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-08-11
Updated: 2014-11-18
Packaged: 2018-02-12 17:49:31
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 17,484
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2119128
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/abelrunner/pseuds/abelrunner
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bucky just wants a place to sleep, some food, maybe some company. Is that so much to ask? In the zombie apocalypse, maybe it is. Or maybe breaking into Steve Rogers' house after the end is the beginning of something great.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Summer: Meetings

**Author's Note:**

> Tags to be added as they become necessary. There's going to be a fair bit of porn later on. Bucky has, and will continue to have, panic attacks and flashbacks due to trauma on account of the zombie apocalypse. 
> 
> Title comes from the unofficial theme song of this AU: Stand By Me, MONA cover.
> 
> Beta is the amazing ink-phoenix.tumblr.com.

_When the night has come,_  
 _And the land is dark_  
 _And the moon is the only light we'll see_  
 _No, I won't be afraid_  
 _Oh, I won't be afraid_  
 _Just as long as you stand_

_Stand by me_

It was high noon when Bucky found the place, a little single story house in the forest in the Northeast. Before the dissolution of civilization, it’d have been something a passerby would have ignored or outright avoided. These days, it was about as close to perfection as you could get. Right next to the road, but isolated enough so that there would be relatively few zoms passing by. Large boulders on either side of the front yard and thick trees around the back, with a heavy slope downwards. Zoms would be forced to attack from a sort of bottleneck from the front, which was easily fortified.

Someone had already taken advantage of it, which didn’t surprise Bucky in the least. Simple barbed wire fences lined the bottleneck in the front of the house, only knee height but enough to waylay some smaller swarms, and Bucky damn near stepped into a fucking bear trap as he approached the front door.

As Bucky crept around the house and continued to survey the area, he noticed a few things. First, the windows were boarded up. Standard for long term survival these days, but a plus in that it was already done. There was a garage with several cans of gasoline, but no car. While this initially worried him, it was explained by a discovery he made soon after: an honest to god generator. Working cars were rare, Bucky reasoned, and if you had a generator, you wouldn’t want to waste gas on one.

“Damn,” Bucky muttered, eyeing the generator appreciatively. “You’re just a little slice of heaven, aren’t you?” The front door, which faced the road, had been boarded up just like the windows, another standard survival tactic these days. The back door was locked, but fairly easy to force open.

When he stepped into the dark little place, he was struck by the smell. He didn’t even know how to describe it, it just smelled… _lived in._ Like things had been moved and slept on and cooked and half-ass cleaned and maybe aired out sometimes. He’d found houses before, little farming houses in the sticks or camping cabins or homes in small towns, though he usually avoided those. They always smelled like must and death. This one had to have smelled the same way at some point, but it didn’t anymore. Someone had cleaned it and lived here.

He felt like a bit of an idiot, blinking hard and dragging in a painful, stuttery breath because of how a place _smelled._ He turned away from it and examined the door. It was pretty sturdy for where the house was, but he’d broken the lock and all it took was a passerby (like himself) or the lucky zom to hit it the right way and get in. He looked around for something to barricade the door with, and he spotted a large bookshelf right next to the door; it was clear it was there specifically for that purpose.

He stared at it. His feet ached in his combat boots; it felt like he hadn’t taken them off since he’d been with the 107th. His well-worn BDUs were stiff and smelly, and frankly, so was he. His stomach felt like it was starting to gnaw on itself out of desperation and damn it, he was _tired._

“It’s still hours till dusk,” he said, turning away from the door without barricading the door. “Hours. Plenty of time. I’ll do that later.”

The layout was simple and small. A little kitchen with a fridge, stove, sink, counter space, cabinet space. A living room with a couch and an actual, honest to god fireplace. Two small rooms off to the side, along with a small bathroom. One room had some tools, a firewood, a little pile of books. The other had what looks like a little indoor garden, potted plants with little slap-and-dash lights set up. Bucky didn’t grow up with a lot of gardens, but he thought he recognized tomatoes, and maybe some carrots. His mouth watered at the thought of fresh vegetables.

He went back into the kitchen and looked in the cabinets. A decent supply of canned food, mostly soup and vegetables. A couple pots and pans. The drawers had the odd spoon and fork. The fridge was off, but cold air still came out when Bucky opened it, eying the rabbit meat inside. So the generator was on recently, and long enough for cold to settle.

He grabbed a random can from the cabinet and a spoon, his hunger getting sharper the longer he stood around in the kitchen. It was condensed cream of mushroom soup, and even thick and heavy and cold, it was amazing. He ate it a bit too fast though, and ended up hunched over the sink, breathing slow and steady and praying his stomach wouldn’t revolt. It had been months since anything heavier than pigeon or the odd, hopefully-not-poisonous berry. Months of scavenging, scrounging, and painfully hungry days and nights. He glanced up at the cabinets again, grinning despite waves of nausea.

As he stepped away from the sink, his stomach settling, Bucky considered the possibility that the person who lived here was still out there. Honestly, he really considered it. But his feet were two big bone-deep aches, he was exhausted, and it was a sweltering afternoon. He couldn’t be bothered to think too deeply on the subject, and there was a couch in the living room with his name on it.

Dropping his gun and bags, he flopped onto the couch and groaned with relief. _Hours till dusk,_ he thought again. _Hours before I have to worry._ He’d been dozing in trees for the past two weeks, ever since he’d fled that settlement to the east. They’d seemed great at first, but all the apple pies in the world wouldn’t convince him to be cannibalized. His previously somewhat cooperative stomach threatened to heave at the memory, and his skin crawled at the memory of running through uneven farmland, drugged and confused, the smell of cooked flesh still clinging to his nostrils. _If Nat hadn’t shown up…_

He pushed the thought away. He did that a lot, because it was easier than thinking about everything. Yonkers, Clyde, the cannibals, the months of dark nights in trees listening to moaning and shuffling below… and, sometimes, screaming. Shove it all in a dark little corner and keep moving forward.

The couch was worn and a little dirty, and he might have turned his nose up at it before the dissolution of society, but here and now, it was fantastic. He shut his eyes with a sigh and slipped happily into sleep.

Bucky’s eyes flew open to a sharp click, and found himself staring down the barrel of a shotgun.

“Who the hell are you?”

The guy was alarmingly skinny, even for someone living in the zombie apocalypse. His arms were shaking just with the effort of holding the weight of the gun, and his clothes hung off him like he was a skeleton, his jaw and cheekbones razor-sharp in his face. He looked like if he actually shot Bucky, he’d go flying through the air from the recoil.

Briefly, Bucky considered the possibility of getting to his own weapons. His gun was on the ground ( _stupid_ ), but his knife was on his belt, ready. Even tired and sore as he was, Bucky knew he could easily handle this guy, who looked like he was made of wire with knots for knees and elbows.

But it wasn’t worth the risk. Despite the guy’s skinny frame, he looked pretty damn serious about the gun in his hand.

“James Buchanan Barnes, buddy,” Bucky said cheerfully. “You can call me ‘Bucky’. Nice place you got here.”

“Yeah, because people don’t normally come around.” The guy’s voice was remarkably deep for his size, like he should have been a couple feet taller and a hundred pounds heavier. He didn’t seem very amused.

“That would be a plus.” Bucky admitted. “Sorry. Didn’t think anyone still lived here.” The guy looked pretty skeptical. “I’m serious. Woulda knocked if I’d known.”

“Well, you’re leaving now,” the guy announced irritably. “So get up and move.”

Bucky felt his heart sink somewhere below his navel. “Aw, come on, buddy,” he said, trying not to sound too desperate. “No reason we can’t be civil.”

“You broke into my house,” the guy snapped. “I have to fix the lock now.” Bucky winced.

“Yeah, that’s… that’s fair.” He muttered. “But come on. Can’t get many people out here. Not a lot of company.”

“No, I don’t.” The guy replied evenly. “It’s one of the perks.” He jerked the gun pointedly, motioning for Bucky to get off his couch. Bucky sighed and got up slowly, keeping his hands in view. When Bucky was on his feet, the guy backed up as far as the rather narrow confines of the house would allow.

Despite the end of the world thing, Bucky was a pretty big guy, tall and strong. Pretty much the only advantage this guy had on him was his gun. The moment Bucky was going to get a hand on his weapons, that advantage would disappear.

Again, Bucky considered the idea of fighting back as he picked up his backpack. It was an ugly, ugly thought, but idea of having this place as his own was very tempting. The woods around the house probably had deer and rabbits; he’d gone hunting and camping with his dad and two little brothers growing up, he knew how to take advantage of that. And the place had a generator, so power, probably running water. A roof over his head, a place to sleep at night.

He recoiled from the thought before it got too far, furious and disgusted with himself. He’d seen people who did that, men and women who killed for what they needed, got so desperate that basic humanity went out the window for survival. He’d seen people like that. Met people like that. There was a reason he traveled alone now.

He shrugged on his backpack and let the guy walk him towards the back door, gun still pointed between Bucky’s shoulderblades.

When Bucky stepped outside, his heart sank. The sky was dark, the last bits of light trickling from between the tree branches. Bucky heard crickets and cicadas chirping, but he knew that soon, he’d hear groaning as well.

“Oh _shit,_ ” he whispered, and then he heard the door behind him close. “No.” He turned around, fists pounding the door. “No, come on, man, let me in!”

“Get moving before they show up!” The guy snapped, his voice slightly muffled by the heavy wood of the door.

“There’s not enough time,” Bucky said desperately. “It’s too dark!”

“You’re wasting time.” The guy said, but he sounded uncomfortable. “They come down the main road usually, just-”

“Just what, go through the fucking forest in the middle of the night with no light?” He felt a laugh tear its way out of him. Was Bucky panicking? He was probably panicking. Sounding unhinged probably wasn’t the best way to get the guy to open the door, but _it was getting darker._ He didn’t know what to kick himself harder over: believing that he’d found some safe haven or fucking up his chances of having a safe haven so catastrophically that he’d gotten kicked out before even having a chance to explain himself.

“You don’t have a _light?_ ” The guy sounded almost exasperated and really, what right did he have to judge? _He_ was the one locking Bucky out when he was most likely to get killed.

“My batteries ran out.” He looked around frantically, trying to calm down, think, _think._ Find a tree, stay in it for the night, maybe they could start over tomorrow, he could at least apologize for breaking into the guy’s house, maybe trade for some food, it’s all good, _this can still work._ But the more he looked, the more he realized there was nothing. There wasn’t a tree nearby with sturdy enough branches or low enough branches, and it was getting darker and darker with each passing second. He grabbed the doorknob and started working at it.

“Don’t- You’ll break the door and then we’re both dead!” Bucky tried to turn the knob but felt resistance, like someone was holding it still on the other side. He heard the guy snarl a curse, then, “You come in here, I shoot!” Bucky froze, his heart shooting into this throat. He weighed the odds feverishly, considering the very real possibility that a shot to head would be quicker and more merciful than the zombie horde. Then he heard the scraping, something heavy being pushed just on the other side of the door.

The bookshelf. That stupid bookshelf.

Bucky felt a sob start to tear at the back of his throat, and bit his lips until he drew blood, trying to swallow it down. He wouldn’t cry. He wouldn’t. He didn’t cry in front of people, and if he was going to die, he’d die fighting, not crying.

It was completely dark, and Bucky could barely see a foot in front of him. He thought he could hear… Yeah, he could. Moaning. Scraping. Guttural groans.

They were coming.

How many bullets did he have? Not enough to waste firing in the dark; he’d miss, waste valuable ammo, make too much noise and draw more zombies to him. He could run, but where? Ultimately, that was just delaying the inevitable.

Zombies were at their most active at night, they were everywhere. In the day, they were sluggish and gathered in dark, cool places. At night, they wandered freely, and were utterly relentless. There was a good reason every green zone and settlement from New York to California had curfews. The only people who traveled at night were the desperate or the suicidal, and even if Bucky was getting increasingly desperate, he wasn’t suicidal just yet. _Not yet._

Bucky tried to even out his breathing as he ran through his options. Main road meant more direct attacks from zombies, but the woods weren’t much better. Running through a forest in the dark was asking for a twisted ankle, a fall down a sudden drop, or worse, a clammy hand grabbing your ankle and yanking you down into the leaves. Crawlers were out there, zombies with no legs who just dragged themselves around. They liked the forests, lots of handholds.

There was no good answer. Bucky’s chances of survival were slim to none. It wasn’t a matter of living, merely deciding how he was going to die.

Bucky’s heart pounded in his throat and head and chest. He scrambled for his gun, holding it too tightly in his violently shaking hands. His legs gave out underneath him and he fell onto the ground, struggling to breathe. He needed to get up, to fight, to give himself a chance. He’d been in tough situations before, but this was different, he’d been _right fucking there._ First person he’d seen in months, and he’d fucked it up.

And now he was going to die.

“I just wanted a place to sleep.” He choked out. God, had that been too much to ask? A place to sleep, some fucking food, maybe a conversation? Was that too much now?

The groaning was getting closer and he couldn’t even get up, couldn’t even get his gun ready. He thought maybe he heard scraping again but the footsteps were getting louder, that shuffling and awful moaning, gunshots and screams, _They’re behind the line, shit, they’re behind the line!_ , zoms dragging themselves from between cars and over the freeway.

_I don’t wanna die, I don’t wanna die, I don’t wanna-_

Bucky felt a hand grab the neck of his jacket, Dum Dum dragging him away from the frontline? _Get up, come on, Jim, ** _get up, dammit._**_

He was hauled back into the house, and was only dimly aware of the door slamming shut. He stared up at the ceiling light over him, his breaths coming out of him in wheezy gasps, the moaning still echoing in his ears. Someone hauled him half up, and then the guy’s sharp, skinny face was close to his.

“Get up!” He said. “Damn it, you gotta help me-” There was a loud bang, at the guy looked away, back behind him. “Shit.” He let Bucky fall back onto the floor.

Bucky’s mind was strangely blank. He couldn’t move, couldn’t think. He could only breathe, each breath painful and ragged and half a sob. He heard scraping again, mixing with the banging and moaning, and it seemed to go on for awhile. Then the scraping stopped.

“Shh, it’s okay.” The guy pulled him up into a sitting position, and Bucky felt his hand rub soothing circles on his back. Bucky hadn’t been touched like that in months, not since Natasha. Despite the panic and nausea, it felt nice.

“ _Thank you,_ ” Bucky choked out. He wanted to cling, to grab the guy and hold on for dear life. He didn’t. He leaned into it when the guy clutched his shoulder, thumb rubbing against his collarbone, but that was all he allowed himself. “ _Thank you, thank you, thank you-_ ”

“It’s fine, Bucky. You’re safe now. Deep breaths, okay?” The guy didn’t sound angry or annoyed or exasperated, like he had before. He was quiet and gentle, soothing. He started rubbing Bucky’s back again and Jesus Christ, it felt good, it was such a simple gesture, but it felt good.

Once Bucky stopped wheezing quite so hard, the guy got up and started fiddling with the stove. Bucky focused on his breathing as the guy turned the stove on and an absolutely delicious smell filled the air. Bucky was dimly aware of the distant groaning and scratching at the boards across the windows, but those sounds were so constant at night that it was little more than background noise.

“Here,” Bucky looked up and saw that the guy had crouched down and offering him a bowl. The guy looked wary, a little nervous, and Bucky couldn’t blame him. Bucky understood all too well what it meant to live in the world it was now. He’d had run with bandits once, after all. Briefly. He knew what this guy was scared of, and he was damn right to be scared.

He wasn’t angry the guy had shoved him out, but he was incredibly grateful that he’d let him back in. The apocalypse killed a lot of things, but basic human decency tended to be the first thing to go. He couldn’t think of many people who would have let him back in after all that, and the impulse to stay grew more difficult to ignore.

_Idiot._ Bucky thought irritably as he took the bowl. _Letting you back in and feeding you doesn’t mean he wants you to move in._

Bucky ate the soup eagerly. It was tomato, and hot, and good enough to make his tongue ache. He drank it way too quickly, and ended up sitting awkwardly while the other guy finished his off on the other side of the kitchen. Bucky took the opportunity to check out his host a bit more carefully.

The guy was skinny, even for the apocalypse. Looked like he’d be about 100 pounds soaking wet, and his jeans and shirt and blue jacket hung off him like he was a scarecrow. He wasn’t bad looking though. Actually, Bucky thought he was pretty handsome, in a bony sort of way. His fingers were very long and slender. Bucky’s mother was a pianist, and she’d have called them an artist's’ hands, a musician’s hands…

The thought sent a sharp stab of pain through his heart. He gritted his teeth and smothered both of them viciously. He hadn’t thought of his mother in nearly a month. He made a point not to. One thing usually led to another, and then he had nightmares and then where would he be?

“Thank you,” Bucky said. “For letting me back in.” The guy flinched a little at the gratitude and didn’t respond for a moment, frowning slightly.

“It’s not a big deal,” he mumbled at last. Bucky shook his head emphatically.

“It’s a big deal,” he said. “You saved my life.” The guy wouldn’t meet his eyes. “I’m serious. Thank you.”

After a moment, the guy just shrugged. “Don’t mention it,” he said. He got up and took the bowl from Bucky. “You can stay the night, but you’re leaving tomorrow, first thing, okay?”

“You got it.” Bucky glanced around as the guy started washing the dishes. Running water, plus there were actual, honest to god lights on. The place was small and a little dirty, but just the light made it amazing. So few places had electricity these days outside of the green zones. “Damn decent place you got here. How’d you set it up?”

“Most if it was already here when I got here,” the guy admitted. “The generator and such. I just boarded up the windows and set up the stuff in the front.” Bucky nodded, then nearly jumped out of his skin as the scratching at the boards turned into banging.

The guy made an irritated sound and opened a drawer, pulling out a box of matches.

“There usually this much noise coming your way, buddy?” Bucky asked, somewhat nervously as the guy began lighting candles.

“Not usually, no,” he replied. “I didn’t turn off the generator though, and that’s pretty noisy. Tends to get them riled up.” The banging grew more emphatic.

“Why didn’t you turn off the generator?” Bucky asked before he could stop himself, and the guy gave him a look as he picked up his shotgun.

“I had a guest,” he said dryly. Bucky smiled sheepishly, and the guy rolled his eyes before turning off the lights.

They sat in the dim light, Bucky with his gun and the guy with his, watching the barricade. The bookcase wobbled a little occasionally, and the two men eyed it nervously and readied their weapons whenever it did, but after what felt like eternity, it finally stood still as the zombies lost interest and wandered off. There were a few things workable about zombies for the clever, and one of them was that they were easily distracted.

“Will it hold?” Bucky asked, trying not to sound too pessimistic.

“It’s held before,” the guy said, not overly worried. “I’ve had the generator on at night a few times. It gets a little tense, but I haven’t had a breach yet.”

“Fair enough. So, uh-”

“You can stay the night,” the guy repeated, cutting him off. “But you’re leaving tomorrow morning, got it?” Bucky fought down the wave of hollow disappointment and nodded.

“Got it,” he said, pushing as much cheer and gratitude into his tone as he could. And he was grateful, just… he’d hoped…

“You can take the couch, if you want.” The guy seemed to assume he would, and set up shop across from the couch, gun in his lap. “I’ll keep an eye on that.” He jerked a thumb towards the bookshelf, and Bucky smiled at him.

“Thanks.” In the dim candlelight, Bucky thought he saw the guy’s lips twitch like he was going to smile back. It didn’t happen. Bucky wondered what the guy would look like if he smiled. Bucky thought he’d look nice. “Hey, I didn’t catch your name.”

The guy blinked, started to say something, then stopped.

“Doesn’t matter,” he said after a pause. “You’ll be gone tomorrow.” Bucky thought he heard disappointment in the guy’s voice, but he was tired and still shaky from before. Could have been anything. Could have been nothing. Bucky curled up on the couch, and when he fell back asleep, the guy was still holding his gun and watching the door.


	2. Summer: Steve

The guy was already up and about when Bucky woke up the next morning. From the dark circles under his eyes, Bucky got the impression that he hadn’t slept a wink. He was over by the stove, stirring something in a pot when Bucky yawned and stretched, feeling refreshed and alarmingly well-rested.

“Hey,” he said, sitting up. “We’re alive.”

The guy looked over and nodded. Then, as an awkward silence started to form, he elaborated reluctantly. “Everything held,” he said, jerking his thumb towards the makeshift barricade that still stood in front of the back door. “There were a few close calls, but everything held.” He yawned jaw-crackingly wide and kept stirring the pot. Whatever it was, it smelled delicious. But then, Bucky reasoned, almost anything would smell delicious at this point. He wondered how it would be not to be hungry all the time, not to be so used to his stomach trying to eat itself that he barely noticed it.

“You get any sleep last night?” He asked. The guy tensed a little, glancing over at him. Bucky blinked innocently, trying to look as inoffensive as possible.

“Some,” he said at length. Bucky didn’t believe him for a minute. “You slept through everything, though.” Bucky snorted and stood up, stretching again.

“What’d I miss?”

“Some near-misses, that’s all,” the guy replied. “It was loud, though.”

“Sleeping through things is one of my signature talents,” Bucky said blithely as he crossed over to the stove. He made sure to make his footsteps slow and heavy, so as not to seem like he was sneaking up or trying to get the jump on the guy. “Got me through some long nights in the army. So, you want me out of here now, I guess?” He’d tried for a joke, but it ended up sounding more pathetic than he meant it to. The guy paused, then spooned out a serving of what looked like beans into a bowl and handed it to him.

“Here. You can get some breakfast before you leave. I’m not… I’m not _cruel_ …” He wasn’t looking at Bucky as he said it, but there was a slightly pleading tone underneath the stiffness. Bucky took the bowl and grinned.

“No, you’re not,” Bucky agreed. “Don’t know a lot of guys who would keep look out for a comatose stranger _and_ cook them breakfast.” The guy’s face did that thing again, where it looked like he was about to smile but stopped himself. Just the slightest twitch of his mouth. Bucky was surprised he even noticed. After a second, the guy nodded abruptly, then started towards the bookshelf and Bucky put the bowl down and hurried over to help. They pushed the bookshelf out of the way.

“Thanks,” the guy said, sounding a little startled. “I’m, uh… gonna check the damage. You… take your time.” He sort of waved towards the food awkwardly before going outside, leaving Bucky to eat.

As before, the food was simple, but the taste was half-forgotten and utterly amazing. Bucky let out an almost obscene moan as he ate, and was very glad his host wasn’t there to hear it.

As he chewed, he thought about what he was supposed to _do_. The guy didn’t want him to stay, obviously, so that was out. North was the green zone, but he hadn’t heard anything particularly _good_ about the Hydra-controlled zone, so he decided to steer clear. He was pretty sure the cannibal commune was to the south, so Bucky decided to never go south again, ever, period. East was too many cities. West was the trader’s camp. He could stay at the camp for awhile, get his bearings, get some news.

Because he definitely wasn’t staying _here_.

And hell, why would he even want to? Bucky scooped another spoonful of beans into his mouth. Wasn’t anything special. And the guy was awful, just _awful_. Rude. Really rude. With those stupid, big blue eyes and that hair that flopped into his face and those hands.

Awful. Bucky didn’t want to stay here anyway. Couldn’t imagine what would be like, not sleeping in trees every night. Not having to scrounge and hope and pray that he’d stumble on something edible. A sink, hell, maybe even a shower. How long had it been since he’d had a shower? An actual shower, not just a bucket of water dumped over his head and the odd rub-down with a face wipe?

He bit down hard on this inside of his cheek to distract himself. He _liked_ the way he lived. He had to like it. If he hated it, then where would he be? It wasn’t as if there was any other option.

He looked around the tiny, dark home, with its stocked cabinets and comfy couch and electricity. It’d be horrible to live here, he thought forcefully, putting the bowl back in the sink. Definitely horrible. So horrible.

When Bucky wandered outside, the guy was still standing in front of the house, staring at the remains of his fortifications. The boards that had covered the windows on the outside had large holes punched through them, and were spattered with dark stains from where the zoms had clawed or bashed at them and torn the skin of their fingers. The bear traps had caught legs and turned walkers into crawlers; barbed wire fences were shoved to the side, more dangerous to humans than zoms now, with grey, shredded flesh lacing the barbs.

The whole thing had gone from solid and dependable to a paper-thin mess within a night, and Bucky winced with the knowledge that he was largely to blame for that.

The guy was slightly blood-splattered, the thick dark stuff on his hands, legs and chest mostly, though there was a fair bit on the left side of his face. He was holding a large axe that Bucky was impressed he could even use. The axe was dripping with blood, and Bucky wondered just how many crawlers were still lurking in the undergrowth. He wished he still had his bat, but he’d broken it a week or so prior. Swung, missed, hit a tree. Oh, that had been an awful day.

Bucky jerked and hissed with surprise as an icy hand suddenly gripped his ankle. He yanked his leg out of the grip of… maybe a woman? Hard to say now, with half the face gone, lower jaw dangling uselessly, eyes milky white and everything below the waist left in tatters from bear traps and barbed wire and miles of walking. He scrambled back out of its reach and held his hand out to the guy.

“Can I borrow that?” He asked. There was a beat. Bucky kept his hand out and didn’t look over, just kept watching the crawler drag its way closer. Then, finally, he felt the wood of the handle touch his hand, warm and slightly sticky with viscous, half-dried brains and viscera. He brought it up high above his head, then down with as much force as he could manage onto the zom’s skull. _Crunch._

“Thanks,” Bucky said, turning back to the guy and handing him back his axe. The guy nodded, taking his weapon back quickly and with a touch of relief. “How many of those did you find out here?”

“More than usual,” the guy grumbled. “Guess the bear traps weren’t the best idea. Ankle-biters are the worst.” Bucky nodded in total agreement, and the guy just kept talking, more to himself than Bucky. “Guess I’ll have to find something else to put there. And change the barbed wire- that’ll be a pain. Gonna have to find good gloves to do that. And haul up more boards… should probably find some metal sheeting; that might be better-” He stopped abruptly. “But uh… This isn’t your problem. Sorry about the whole, um… nearly-killing-you thing?”

“Thanks for the whole not-letting-me-die thing.” Bucky said reassuringly. The guy’s face got all pinched and uncomfortable again, so Bucky pressed on, “And the food. Maybe we’ll…” Bucky trailed off. “You know… That stuff _could_ be my problem.”

The guy gave him a raised eyebrow. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I could help you out,” Bucky said, deciding to be frank. “The two of us would get the work done faster than if it was just you, and I know where to find some metal sheeting. It’s in town, though. I could cover your back, help you get it up-”

“I can do it myself,” the guy snapped. “I ain’t helpless.”

Bucky held up his hands in surrender. “Ain’t saying you are. Just, it’s better to have someone watching your back, don’t you think?” The guy glared, and Bucky tried his best to look honest and innocent and not totally frustrated. The guy just looked at him like he was trying to make Bucky break and admit to evil intent, squinting suspiciously and for such a long time that Bucky seriously thought that his silence was meant to be an answer in and of itself. Then the guy looked away, towards the now-ramshackle boards over the windows and claw marks on the side-paneling.

“You said you were gonna leave,” the guy said finally, and Bucky blinked. There was something odd about his tone that Bucky couldn’t quite place.

“I will if you want me to,” he said. “Just trying to help out. My fault it’s all wrecked after all.” The guy looked at him for a long time again, then nodded reluctantly.

“Fine,” he said. “Where’s this metal sheeting?”

“At a scrap yard in town, a few miles south,” Bucky said, relieved. “It’ll take awhile to-”

“I have a car,” the guy nodded towards the garage. “It’s nothing special, but it’ll get us there.”

“Thought you didn’t have a car,” Bucky admitted as he followed him to the ramshackle garage. The guy turned and looked at him quizzically.

“Why?”

“Dunno. Figured you’d save the gas for the generator?”

“I do, generally,” he said slowly. “But the car’s useful. Nothing special.”

\--

“ _It runs pretty fast..._ ” Bucky whispered as they tore down the road. “ _It’s nothing special..._ ”

“You’re muttering again.”

Bucky turned and stared. “You have a Jag in your garage and you said it was ‘nothing special’!” The guy merely shrugged, driving Bucky further up a wall. “It’s a Jaguar!”

“It’s a car,” The guy said, as if Bucky was the one being ridiculous. “It gets me places.”

“It’s a _Jag_ ,” Bucky insisted. “It’s a luxury car. With leather seats. _That you ate._ ” Bucky glared at the back seat, where the seats had been somehow ripped out. The guy didn’t even the good grace to look ashamed.

“It was winter. I was hungry. What was I supposed to do?” Bucky couldn’t think of an adequate answer to that, so he just gritted his teeth and shut up.

A Jaguar. The guy had had a _Jaguar_ in his garage, so beat up and dented and bloodsplattered that it was a wonder it ran as good as it did. It clearly wasn’t from any work the guy did; he had responded to questions about the engine and such with blank stares and shrugs, until Bucky had dropped the subject.

As they ate up the pavement, Bucky was starting to wonder if the dents on the car were from zombies, or from its owner’s terrifying driving.

“You almost killed us!” Bucky squeaked as the guy nearly clipped an abandoned car just off the side of the road. The guy huffed in irritation.

“It’s fine.”

“It’s really not!”

“Shut up, I’m trying to concentrate.” Bucky breathed in through his nose, out through his mouth, and gripped the armrests tight enough to make his joints creak.

In and out. In and out.

Finally, miraculously, the car came to a stop a hundred yards outside of town. Bucky got out and surveyed the damage. The Jag had been pretty bad before, but he thought there might be a few new dents along the side now.

“Would you stop that?” The guy said, exasperated. “Let’s go.”

The town had been one of the larger ones in the area, with a population of maybe twenty thousand or so before the Panic. In the three years since, the place had largely cleared out of living inhabitants. The dead still roamed, but didn’t like the light, or heat. Bucky guessed that it was high noon when they picked their way carefully into town. Most of the zoms would be huddled up together somewhere cool, or at least dark. Bucky and his partner were about as safe as they could possibly get in the summer.

The guy had parked fairly close to the scrap yard so Bucky volunteered to grab the sheets while Steve looked for gloves. “It’s no problem,” he said, confidently. “I’ve hauled heavier stuff.” The guy scowled and made to protest, but Bucky cut him off quickly. “Besides,” he said. “Can’t exactly find you gloves that fit you myself, can I? And we’ll get more stuff done if we split the work.” The guy pressed his lips together in a tight, irritated line.

“If you think you can handle it,” he said, clearly not liking it. “Don’t worry about me. I can take care of myself,” he added pointlessly. Then, almost as an afterthought, “Watch your back, yeah?”

Bucky hauled sheet metal for nearly an hour, and other than the the usual vigilance for the odd walker or crawler, it was pleasantly mindless work. His jacket quickly grew heavy and sticky with sweat, but he could hardly take it off. It was his last line of defense in the case of a zombie getting too close.

Putting the rusty, filthy sheets of metal into the back of the Jag, borderline clunker though it was, was heartbreaking.

“I’m so sorry, baby,” he whispered, shoving the last piece of adequately sized sheet metal into where the back seat used to be. “I’m so sorry. It’s necessity. I don’t _like_ doing this-”

“Wow,” Bucky nearly jumped out of his skin and whirled to find the guy standing behind him. He had a large, heavy looking roll of barbed wire over his shoulder, and thick leather gloves on his hands.There was more blood on his arms, legs and face, hinting at a more exciting afternoon than Bucky’s. He shook his head, a look of amused wonder on his face. “Wow. That’s… You’re talking to the car?”

“First of all,” Bucky said, slamming the door shut and ignoring the guy’s wince at the noise. “You’re way too quiet. I could have shot you.”

“You didn’t even grab your gun,” the guy pointed out.

“Second of all,” Bucky pressed on. “It’s not just a car, buddy. It’s a _Jaguar_. This is a state of the art, luxury vehicle-”

“It was.” The guy said, and Bucky thought he detected a hint of mischief in his tone. “A bit beat up now to qualify, isn’t it?”

“You’re evil.” Bucky declared. “This car deserves someone who will love her-”

“Oh my god, how long has it been since you’ve seen another human being?” Any other time, Bucky would’ve probably taken offense, but the guy was… laughing. Laughing and smiling. It was nice. The grin dominated his face for a brief, beautiful moment before he cut himself off. “You’re ridiculous,” the guy said, only barely a trace of that smile left, but Bucky thought he still saw amusement in those blue eyes. “Get in.” Bucky thought about the breakneck speeds and multiple near-misses of the drive over and hesitated. The guy rolled his eyes. “Do you want to drive?”

“Oh my god, yes, please.”

“The brake sticks sometimes,” the guy said as he put on his seatbelt. “Turning’s a little weird, watch out for that. And it goes really, _really_ fast, so don’t push on the brake too quick.”

“You got it,” Bucky said reverently, running his hands over the dashboard. “You’re the boss, boss.”

“Just get us back to the house.” The guy muttered, handing Bucky the keys. As Bucky turned it on, he asked, “How’d you get the keys to this thing? I’ve had to hotwire the ones I’ve used.”

“Broke into a house a few months back,” he replied. “Whoever lived there still had all their cars. There were a couple of zoms, nothing major. I took the one that seemed the least ridiculous.”

“What other cars were there?” Bucky asked before he could stop himself. Predictably, the guy shrugged.

“Oh, flashy ones. Stupid colors, weird looks, that sort of thing.” So, probably really high end custom cars. Bucky bit back a groan at the thought of them just sitting there, forgotten, probably in great shape, just _wasted_. “I almost grabbed this big, blocky humvee looking thing, but it looked like it maybe got a mile to the gallon.”

Bucky snorted and nodded, “Good call.”

There was a brief lapse in conversation, but the silence wasn’t awkward. Bucky hummed cheerfully and wove between abandoned cars on the highway as the guy stared out the window.

“Couldn’t find anything else to put along the outer perimeter,” the guy said abruptly. “Just have to make do with the barbed wire. The metal sheeting’ll make a difference though. Thanks for that.”

“No problem,” Bucky said, pleased. “Need help getting it up? It’s a bit heavy,” he warned. The guy was silent for a moment.

“Fine. If you want to.” Bucky nodded, and they left it at that for the rest of the ride back to the house.

They pulled into the front yard with minimal damage done to the poor, beaten down Jaguar, and after a brief, quiet lunch of canned ravioli, Bucky set to work pulling down the old, half-shredded boards and replacing them with the metal sheeting while his host took down and replaced the barbed wire fortifications in the front.

Despite the sun sinking lower in the sky, Bucky’s jacket seemed to get heavier and stiffer the longer he worked. Sweat dripped from his face, stinging as it got into his eyes, until he finally threw the hammer down in irritation, narrowly avoiding crushing his own foot.

“Uh, hey!” He called out to the guy, who looked up. “Do you mind of I, uh…” He gestured meaningfully to his upper half, hoping the guy got the picture. It took a moment, but he got his point across and the guy understood what he was asking.

“Oh.” He said, gaping a little. “Oh, uh. Yeah. G-go ahead.” He went back to his work before Bucky could figure out if his face had been that bright red from the heat before Bucky had asked if it was okay to take off his shirt. Bucky grinned in spite of himself, a little spark of something warm settling in his stomach, pleasant despite the heat. It had been quite a long time since he’d been with anyone for any considerable period of time. Natasha was his last traveling partner, and they’d parted ways… maybe three months back? Hard to say. That last night with Natasha was the last time he’d been with anyone… But he was being ridiculous. He shook his head wryly as he pulled his shit off, enjoying the breeze on his skin.

More than once, he thought he caught the guy staring. He tried to keep his grin from being too obvious.

Eventually, he realized that the sky above them was dark blue, the edges of the horizon red and orange and pink.

“Uh, getting a little late, isn’t it?” Bucky called out, and he heard the guy curse explosively.

“Fuck! How far along are you with those windows?”

“Last one,” Bucky assured him, and the guy hurried over to help him secure it over the window to the bathroom. Despite the slowly sinking sun, Bucky sort of wished he’d slow down a bit. Or speed up. Or say something. A cold knot of fear started to grow in his stomach. It was far too late for any sort of traveling, and neither of them had said anything about him staying another night. In fact, the assumption had been that he wasn’t staying at all, and the guy certainly didn’t seem overly concerned about throwing him out the day before. “What now?” he asked once they were finished, not daring to presume.

“Get inside.” The guy said, gathering up the tools. “Ugh, I should have been paying more attention…” Bucky barely managed to keep himself from sighing in relief as he followed Steve into the house.

They sat, huddled in the dim light of candles as zombies scrapped feebly at the metal. Bucky noticed that there were far fewer tonight than the night before; the generator being off made a huge difference. They ate more ravioli cold from the can, but they were both ravenous and scarfed it down with abandon.

As he scraped the tomato sauce from around the edges of the can, Bucky stalled and hesitated. Yes, it was dark. Totally, pitch black dark, and the walkers were out in force. The guy wouldn’t throw Bucky out again… would he? “Want me to take watch tonight?” Bucky asked nonchalantly.

The guy looked up sharply. “No.” Bucky tried to hide how much that hurt. The guy seemed to realize how that sounded, and when he spoke next, his tone was gentler. “No, that’s fine. You’re traveling tomorrow, right? You should rest.”

Bucky swallowed past the sudden lump in his throat. “Yeah.” He said shortly. “Right.”

There was an awkward silence that neither of them were willing to break. They settled in for the night in that silence, Bucky on the couch, the guy across the room with his gun in his lap.

It took a very long time for Bucky to fall asleep. He stretched out on the couch, still and silent, listening to the moans and soft scratching at the metal sheeting outside, to the soft, slightly wheezy breathing of the guy across the room.

 _I don’t want to go._ He thought miserably. He liked this. The warm food and soft couch. And the company. The small, prickly company. Who was probably watching him like a hawk from across the room because he had a brain, had to have a brain and skills out the wazoo to have survived this long. And alone for awhile, it seemed. _And he’s got a nice smile…_

Bucky bit down on the inside of his cheek hard to give himself another reason for the sudden sting in his eyes. It was never going to be long-term anyway. He would leave in the morning, go to the trader’s camp, figure it all out from there.

The next morning, Steve fed him again, and they didn’t say much as they sat on the floor together and ate.

“So…” The guy muttered as they put the plates away. “I’ll guess, uh…”

“Yeah.” Bucky said, trying to keep his disappointment off his face. “Yeah.” Bucky shouldered on his pack, stopped in the doorway, then turned back to look at Steve and said, “You know, I was in the Army. I could help you out with fortifications. Just planning stuff?” The guy stared for a moment, clearly thinking very quickly.

“The Army?”

“Yeah. I think I mentioned that.”

“You did.” He nodded slowly. “Yeah. Okay. Just planning stuff. Just for a bit.”

They talked well into the night, and settled into their positions without a word.

Bucky woke up to see the guy curled up on the floor, asleep. He smiled softly.

“Hey,” he whispered. The guy’s eyes fluttered open. “Wanna get to work on those fortifications today, buddy?”

\--

And so it went, over and over again. Bucky would wake up, insist on helping the guy around the house, and the guy would accept his offer. Bucky noticed with pleasure that as the days went by, his friend grew less and less reluctant about accepting his help. After a week, he came to accept Bucky not leaving immediately as a matter of course.

He didn’t tell Bucky his name, though. Not for awhile.

“You’re not _staying_ ,” his friend insisted, despite obvious evidence to the contrary. “There’s no _point._ ”

Bucky didn’t know when the guy stopped being ‘the guy’ and started being ‘his friend’. It was nice though. Calming. He didn’t feel as on edge as he did before, when he was alone. He hoped that he’d have a name for the guy eventually. He tried guessing it, but it turned into a game to try and get the guy to laugh again.

“Darryl,” he’d put forward. The guy rolled his eyes.

“Who names their kid ‘Darryl’ anymore?”

“Jefferson?”

“That’s not a name.”

“It _is_ , but anyway. Jesús?”

“I’m the whitest man in Northeast America, Bucky,” he said, but Bucky saw the grin start to form.

“Darwin?”

“Yes!” The guy said excitedly. Bucky blinked.

“What, really?” The guy’s face went from an excited smile to an exasperation.

“Of course not,” he said. “You think my parents _wanted_ me to get beat up at school?” Bucky shrugged.

“Zebedee?”

“People don’t name their children that.”

“Subaru?” The guy stared, then turned away and hunched over, choking out laughter over the sink. “It’s a name! I knew a guy name Subaru. Not even Japanese. His parents were full time WASPs, just thought it was a nice name.” His friend shook his head, still laughing, and Bucky had to shush him before he got too loud.

“Come on,” he wheedled through a jaw-cracking grin. “You know _my_ name.”

“You’re not staying,” his friend reminded him, still grinning. Bucky was past the point where that statement hurt; they both knew it was ridiculous. His friend was just being stubborn for the sake of it. Bucky would get him to break eventually.

The day his friend relented was a stormy one, with dark clouds looming overhead and the distant rumble of thunder, a late summer storm promising to wash away weeks of terrible heat. They didn’t know how long the rain would last or how hard it would be, so Bucky and his friend went into town to look for supplies. Just some canned food to hold them over until the storm passed.

They’d been going through some poor bastard’s house when said poor bastard took exception to them rooting through his cabinets. He was a sorry sight, eyes glazed milky white and clothing rotting off his frame. But he was quicker and quieter than most, and Bucky was barely able to catch him leaping at his friend in time to shove between the two, throwing his arm up.

The walker bit down on his arm, and Bucky heard his friend scream like he’d been stabbed. Adrenaline rushing through him, Bucky grabbed the knife from his belt and brought the blade down on the zom’s head, hard. With a soft, meaty, ugly sound, it buried itself to the hilt, and the zom’s jaw loosened as it slumped to the ground. Bucky stood, staring at it and panting, feeling a little wild. Then he heard a soft _click_ from behind him.

He turned and saw his friend pointing a gun at his head, jaw clenched so tightly Bucky was surprised he wasn’t spitting out his own teeth.

“No no no!” He held his arm out. “Look! See? No bite!” His friend blinked, confused, and peered closer. No bite. “Duct tape.” Bucky said, his voice shaking with hysterical laughter. “They can’t bite through it. Got it on my arms, o-on my legs, see?” He shook his legs a little, drawing attention to the tape wrapped around his calves and thighs, leaving his knees free to bend. He didn’t think his friend had missed the tape’s existence completely, but maybe he didn’t realize what the purpose was. “Old Army trick. It’s fine!”

His friend stared, and Bucky saw ugly, desperate hope in his eyes. “I’m fine. Strip me down, look yourself, _I’m fine, buddy._ ” His friend swayed suddenly, gripping the kitchen counter and looking dangerously close to throwing up. Bucky made a move towards him but he held up his hand sharply, stopping him in his tracks, and glared at him.

“You goddam fucking moron,” he snarled. “You- What the fuck was that?” Bucky bristled at the tone.

“Me saving your ass?” Bucky snapped back. “Look, buddy, I’m not expecting that much, but a little fuckin’-”

“Steve.” The guy gritted out.

“What?” Bucky said, his momentum gone in a flash.

“Steve.” He said again, sounding more like he was admitting defeat than his name. “My name is Steve.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> PORN NEXT TIME. I will try to be less obnoxiously late.


	3. Autumn: Roots

As summer turned into autumn, the weather grew chillier and the days grew shorter, giving Bucky and Steve less and less time to prepare for winter.

Winter was always a mixed bag, and Bucky couldn’t remember an autumn since the Outbreak that wasn’t spent scrambling to prepare. In the initial chaos and subsequent fallout, the environment became such a low priority that decisions with catastrophic long-term consequences were considered small potatoes. Last Bucky had heard, a couple of countries had lobbed some nuclear missiles at each other during the initial panic and collapse of international communication and diplomacy, leaving most of Eastern Europe irradiated. All around the world, fires blazed. Cities, towns, farms. The riots left a lot of places as singed husks.

And the body piles… the 107th had had that duty more than a few times. Shooting zoms and dragging the bodies into the street, piling them up and burning them. In one town, there must have been a dozen of those foul smelling, awful pyres. Bucky couldn’t imagine how many burned in a single city.

The ash, the nuclear fallout in Eastern Europe, and the millions of nuclear and chemical warehouses and factories that were abandoned and allowed to break down would have been bad enough. But word had come from the north too that the poor, stupid people that fled there had ripped Northern Canada apart. So many people, and only so many trees, only so much wildlife. And so much trash.

Now, just eight years later, the world wasn’t gonna take much more damage. The seasons had become brutal, and winters especially so. While zombies froze and became a non-issue, having food, shelter and firewood was even more important than before.

Bucky had seen what happened when winter caught people unprepared. How many homes, campsites or entire communes had the 107th stumbled on, their bodies frosted over and rock hard? Whether they’d died from hunger, disease or the cold, it didn’t matter. They’d died all the same.

So Bucky and Steve made use of every second of light there was to scrounge and stockpile gasoline, canned food, water, and firewood. They harvested from the little indoor garden that Steve kept, and Bucky had learned how to dry meat from one of the settlements he’d stayed at, and started hunting the surrounding rabbits and deer to make jerky, and also add a bit of variety. Plus, while the little town to the south was still fairly well-stocked in canned goods, it did no good to bleed it dry.

Still, they didn’t have everything they needed for a long winter. There was only so much they could piece together.

“I was thinking we could head over to the trader’s camp later this week?” Bucky suggested one night. They’d decided to have one of the rabbits freshly cooked, a break from the constant stream of canned pasta and beans. The fresh meat made Bucky think about the things they couldn’t scavenge: soap, medicine, other things that had been picked over years before.

“The what?”

“The trader’s camp.” Steve stared at him. “The camp. With traders? People go there to trade stuff? Barter? Exchange things for goods and services?” Steve’s eyebrows rose as Bucky bungled on with increasing awkwardness. “Don’t you know- wait. You didn’t know about the trader’s camps? They’re not that far…”

“How far away are they?” Steve asked, suddenly frowning.

“Two, three miles down the west road.” Bucky said slowly, taking in Steve’s total shock and worry with some confusion. “Jesus, man, how long have you been here?”

“A couple years, I guess…” Steve said. “Two winters, three summers now…” Bucky stared, utterly flummoxed.

“You’ve been here two years and you didn’t know there was a trader’s camp a few hours walk from your house?” Steve shrugged and looked away. Bucky knew he was pushing a little too hard here, but it was insane.

“I don’t leave that much.” Steve said, not meeting Bucky’s eye. Bucky drummed his fingers on the floor, and for a moment those drum beats and the soft scraping of nails on the sheet metal over the windows were the only sounds.

“Well, you should.” Bucky declared. “We should go. We’ll go into town over the next few days, collect some extra stuff to trade. You okay with that?” He added, seeing Steve’s stiff look.

“... Yeah.” Steve replied after a pause. “Sure.”

He didn’t say much else afterwards, and they went to bed in silence, Bucky wondering if he’d crossed some line without knowing it.

\--

The next day, they set out to drive into town to collect odds and ends, things they didn’t exactly need but figured someone else might. As they went down the main road at a crawl, Bucky gave the rundown on what to look for.

“Socks, pads and tampons and that sort of thing, underwear, canned food, toilet paper,” Bucky intoned solemnly. “Sure to make you so many friends at the camps.” Steve looked politely skeptical. “What, you think of something more important?”

“Ammo?” Steve suggested. Bucky shook his head.

“In winter? Not really. You spend more time trying to survive the night. Anytime else definitely, but you’re not going to be able to shoot much if you’re starving or lost half your foot from the gangrene you got from your disgusting sock that’s been in your boot for the last five months, so even in the summer, fresh clothes and food are basics.”

“And pads and tampons?” Steve challenged. Bucky rolled his eyes as he pulled into the parking lot of a large stripmall.

The sidewalk in front was overgrown and bloodspattered, with a few long-dead wanderers and zoms here and there. The stripmall featured a jewelry store, an athletics shop, a couple of food joints, and a women’s clothing outlet. The front windows of the stores were shattered, the jagged teeth of the glass still edged with dried blood from the looters breaking in and out. The shops around the strip mall, restaurants and mom-and-pop stores, were all in similar condition: broken, ransacked, blood-stained.

The place was deserted but for a few distant zoms that were making their ponderous way down the street. The town of Marshall’s Mill had long since been abandoned, though even years after its living inhabitants had fled to the north, it was still place rich in loot.

“I know you’ve been all alone in your fancy electric club house-” Bucky said, parking crookedly in front of the jewelry store.

“It’s a house with electricity, it’s not a ‘club house’ and it’s certainly not fancy-”

“But despite what pre-Outbreak tv shows predicted, the post-apocalyptic world isn’t nearly as big of a sausage fest as you might think.” Steve snorted and shook his head, clearly trying to smother a grin.

“Well, I’ll take your word for it,” he said dryly.

“Awww, no lovin’ for Stevie?” Bucky asked teasingly as they got out of the car. Steve pressed a finger to his lips.

“Shut up. You want every zom in town to come out here?” He whispered, as if Bucky didn’t know that the car would have drawn them in anyway. There obviously weren’t any in the immediate area, if they weren’t already getting their heads caved in with axes and shovels. “And I didn’t _start out_ in the clubhouse, thank you very much.”

He and Bucky went to the trunk to grab their weapons: Steve’s ax and Bucky’s shovel. No reason to bring a gun and wake the whole town up over a single zom. Bucky eyed him with some interest. Steve didn’t talk much about how he got to his little haven. Or at all, in fact. He tended to change the subject, sometimes subtly, sometimes too quickly to qualify. Bucky didn’t even know if Steve had family left.

Bucky wished that sort of mysteriousness could be sexy, but instead, it just made him sad. What if Steve didn’t have _anyone?_ What if Bucky was all he had? Bucky had friends out there, a few traders if they were still alive. Nat was definitely still alive. He couldn’t imagine not hearing if the 107th hadn’t gone down, so they had to still be out there somewhere. And chances were good that Clyde was still out there too, making trouble. He had friends. Far-flung and hard to reach, but out there. Who did Steve have? Anyone?

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Bucky asked then, slinging his shovel over his shoulder. “Steve, are you trying to imply-”

“That I’m an adult who’s had relationships with other adults?” Steve jerked a thumb towards a Dressbarn. “I’ll look in there, okay?” Bucky rolled his eyes at the obvious evasion.

“Fine. I’ll take the jewelry store. But this conversation isn’t over!” he called out after Steve, who waved negligently back at him as he walked away. The grin on Bucky’s face slid away as watched Steve go into the store.

He could probably do it. He’d thought about it. A lot. Kissing Steve. Sleeping with Steve. Pulling off Steve’s clothes and running his hands over his skin, nipping at his throat, his jaw, his-

_Back up,_ Bucky thought viciously as he went into the store. _Now it is not the time._

But he could. He didn’t think Steve would mind, and he was pretty damn good at being a… What? Boyfriend? Lover? Were those still things, post-apocalypse? He’d fooled around a fair bit since the Outbreak, but the idea was that they were one-time things, meaningless beyond being able to touch someone.

And hell, even that was a lot these days. Touching people had been off-limits during the first outbreak, back when no one knew how the damn Z virus spread. He’d been in the army at the time, and even his buddies, Gabe and Dum-Dum and Monty and the rest, none of them would touch anyone. Not a handshake, not an arm slung over the shoulder, nothing. He’d felt like he was about to shake out of skin from the need to touch. The day the CDC had declared the virus wasn’t spread from skin-to-skin contact or even saliva swapping was pretty much heaven on earth. He lost count of how many other people, in the army and on base, just fell over themselves to screw each other, or just be held.

Whenever he saw an eight year old these days, he had to laugh a little. He knew why that kids’ parents decided to fuck that night. A whole new Baby Boom. Hopefully they’d suck a bit less than the last group of Baby Boomers.

But these days, it wasn’t that much different. There were people who, like Bucky, didn’t see or touch another human for months. Didn’t stumble on another traveler or another settlement that was willing to even talk, much less do anything else. And when that sort of thing did happen, it was rarely with someone you’d spend more than a day with.

But Steve. He lived with Steve. It was working out with Steve. And if Steve didn’t want to, and Bucky pushed too hard, or stepped over the line…

Bucky and Steve were friends, and that was enough. More than enough. More than Bucky could begin to hope for the way the world was now.

Bucky checked the place out for zoms. A couple of crawlers were dragging themselves around behind the back counters, and it was easy enough to bust their heads with the shovel blade.

Whistling cheerfully, Bucky set to work grabbing as much jewelry as he could and dumping it into his bag. He and Steve would sort out what they’d trade later. Generally speaking, jewelry wasn’t important anymore. You’d find the odd person looking for a ring for a special someone, but more often than not, it was pointless. The metal could be melted down for things though, like makeshift ammo. Not great ammo, but it’d do in a pinch. The place had been mostly looted out, but there was still a decent amount of the cheaper stuff. All the better, since cheaper meant not as much of the soft stuff, like gold.

Then, Bucky felt the press of cold metal against the back of his neck.

“Turn around slowly, slick. And hands up.” Bucky glanced over at his shovel, leaning against the counter, three feet away and useless besides. He lifted his hands above his head and turned.

The woman was tall and gaunt, with long dark hair and filthy, dirt-encrusted clothing. In her hands was an intimidating sawed off shotgun, and it was pointed right at Bucky’s chest. Bad enough on its own, but Bucky knew the woman, which made it fifty times worse.

“Hillary,” Bucky said, grinning down the barrel of the rifle and feeling his heart hammering in his throat. “Been awhile.”

“Sure has,” she said. “How ya been, slick?”

“Oh, you know. It’s been a mixed bag.” He replied. “I’d feel a lot better if you weren’t pointing a gun at me though, I gotta say…”

“Well, we didn’t exactly part on the best of terms last time, did we?” She said coldly, and Bucky felt his heart plummet and settle somewhere around his navel. He swallowed hard and fought to keep his easy grin on his face.

“N-no. I guess not. Hey, how’s Clyde?”

“Wouldn’t know.” Hillary said, taking a step closer to Bucky and forcing him back against the counter. Bucky kept his hands up, level with his head; if he gave her a reason to shoot, she would. He’d only been with Clyde and his gang for a month or so, but that was enough to know that Hillary loved exercising her trigger finger on anything and anyone.

“After you ran off, he kicked me out,” she continued. “Said you had a point. Said I was bad business.”

“Well, generally speaking-” Bucky started, but the end of the gun tapped his chin and he shut up.

“So I’ve been out here by myself for these last few months,” she concluded. “Dunno how Clyde or the boys’ve been. Fuck ‘em. And fuck you too. You think whinin’ about how I do my business and getting me kicked out made me, what? Meet Jesus or some shit? You think havin’ me thrown out to the wolves made me ‘tone it down’?” She mimicked his Brooklyn accent in a high, whiny tone, then laughed nastily. Bucky resisted the urge to spit in her face. She saw the expression on his face and sneered. “But I wouldn’t waste my time on the poor saps I got my new shit from if I were you, pretty boy. Your brother may have saved your ass from getting shot but I ain’t takin’ orders from him anymore, am I?”

“Apparently not.” Bucky said. _Shit._

“So gimme one good reason why I shouldn’t blow your brains out right now.”

“Umm…” Bucky shifted, stalling, trying to figure out how to get out of this. “Well, if you shoot…” She was standing in front of the route to the front door, and the barrel was about three inches from his chest. “Zombies will come, won’t they? That won’t be fun for you.”

“It will be when I drive off in that fancy car you got outside.” Hillary said, leveling the shotgun to Bucky’s forehead. _Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit._

“I think you’re overestimating how fancy it is.” Bucky told her, carefully wriggling his foot underneath his bag. “There’s only, like, two seats, and the back has rust stains and-”

With no warning, he suddenly kicked the bag up as hard as he could. It scattered bracelets, necklaces and earrings onto the floor and flew up into Hillary’s face.

Bucky flung himself to the floor, and the jewelry case above him shattered as Hillary cursed and pulled the trigger. Bucky scrambled for cover, diving behind another jewelry case and trying to make his way to the front door. As he did so, the glass case behind him exploded with another roar of the shotgun.

“I don’t have time for your bullshit, Barnes!” Hillary yelled. The glass case in front of Bucky shattered in an explosion of glass shards with another shotgun blast. Bucky turned and retreated to the back of the store, keeping as low as he could.

“Are you insane!?” Bucky snapped, glass crunching beneath his boots. “Are you trying to get us all killed!?”

“Shut the fuck up!” Hillary screamed, and Bucky heard the sounds of her reloading. _Shit, shit, shit, shit-_

He waited for the deafening roar of the shotgun. What he heard instead was an ugly, wet _thunk._

Hillary screamed out another curse. There was another blast, and Bucky saw a mannequin head shatter across the room. Then, another wet _thunk,_ this time with a crunch behind it, sick and chilling.

Bucky heard a choked out gasp and a soft thud.

_Thunk._

_Thunk._

Then, just ragged gasps that weren’t his own.

“Shit.” Bucky choked, scrambling out from behind the counter. His hand hit something slick and hot, and he slipped onto the ground… and into a fresh pool of blood. He looked up. “ _Shit._ Steve?”

Steve stood across the room, staring at Hillary, clutching his ax with a tight grip in shaking hands. His breathing had an ugly wheeze to it, and was coming out rapid and rough. There was red on his hands, on his chest, on his face, dripping from the ax’s blade from where it had collided with Hillary’s flesh, from the handle where it had sprayed onto it.

And oh, Hillary was a mess. Bucky could see where the ax had hit her, hacking up her shoulder, her torso, her neck, and finally her head. She was taller than Steve, stronger than Steve, Steve hadn’t gotten a clear hit… it was everywhere.

Bucky’s stomach heaved, but he swallowed hard and shut his eyes tight. He couldn’t break down now. His mind moved quickly, taking in the situation. Hillary was dead but she’d shot her gun five times, and that was bound to attract every zom from there to Canada. Steve hadn’t moved, hadn’t said anything, and if Bucky knew anything about that kind of thing, he knew Steve wouldn’t be doing or saying much for awhile. Bucky had to keep his cool, had to get them out of there.

He tried to stand, but his legs gave out a little. He tried again, grabbing onto the nearby counter to heave himself up. “Steve,” he said as he pulled himself to his feet. “Steve, you okay?” He didn’t look okay. He didn’t respond to Bucky’s voice, didn’t look up or loosen his grip on the ax’s handle. Bucky could see him shaking. “Steve, hey, look at me.”

When Steve still didn’t respond, Bucky whispered, “I’m gonna come closer, okay?” and took a slow step forward. “Steve, I’m gonna take the ax, alright? It’s just me, I’m just… I’m gonna take the ax.” He reached out, keeping his movements careful and keeping his eye on Steve, who still hadn’t moved or said anything or looked away from the corpse or the ever-spreading pool of red.

Bucky wrapped his hand around the handle of the ax, still slick and dripping. “I’m gonna take it, alright?” Bucky whispered. The ax slid from Steve’s hands without resistance, and Bucky very carefully set it to the side, still watching his friend. Steve hadn’t looked away from the body in front of him.

The relative silence that followed was broken by soft groaning, and both Bucky and Steve jumped as something began to pound at a door in the back of the store. Bucky looked from the door in the back to the doors in the front. He didn’t see any zoms out front, but that was sure to change soon. He reached out and cupped Steve’s face between his hands, gently turning Steve’s head until finally, finally, Steve looked away from Hillary and met Bucky’s gaze.

“Stevie,” Bucky said softly. “We gotta go. There are zoms coming, okay? I’m gonna get us to the car and get us home, but you gotta move, alright?” Steve stared at him, eyes wide and a little desperate. He was trembling, and looked so awfully small.

Bucky knew Steve would hate being thought of like that, small and scared, but he also knew he’d been the same way the first time he’d killed someone. Bucky quickly shrugged off his jacket and wrapped it around Steve, rubbing Steve’s arms through the faded cloth. “Okay, buddy, come on. Let’s move.” He wrapped an arm around Steve’s shoulders and gently herded him out of the jewelry store.

Outside, the zoms were struggling down the street, but they were slow and far off. The bulk of the inevitable swarm was still far off in the distance, though Bucky could hear more behind the stores, banging on windows and doors and groaning endlessly. Bucky silently thanked God that they’d parked so close, and got Steve into the passenger’s seat with no trouble.

Bucky sat in the driver’s seat of the Jag and breathed. In and out. In and out. He didn’t have much time. He needed to get Steve home, he needed to get Steve safe.

He locked the doors and pulled out of the parking lot, driving past zoms who feebly pawed after the retreating car. Bucky gripped the steering wheel and whispered, “Breathe for me, Steve. Deep breaths. In and out, okay? Just breathe. That’s all you gotta do.” He listened to the sound of Steve obliging, breathing in and breathing out. Watching the road and listened. Heard every stutter and every wheeze. His grip on the wheel got tighter.

About five miles out, Steve suddenly said, “Pull over.” Bucky obeyed, checking the immediate area for zoms as he came to a stop in the middle of the road. The second Bucky killed the engine, Steve opened the door, scrambled out to the side of the road, and vomited.

Bucky got out of the car and rushed over, rubbing Steve’s back as he retched. Bucky felt his heart twist in his chest as Steve dissolved into sobs, and he tugged Steve into a hug.

“It’s okay,” Bucky whispered. “It’s okay. I know. I know, Stevie.” Steve clung and slumped into Bucky’s arms, forcing him to hold Steve up more than anything. Blood was smearing on Bucky’s shirt and arms, as he pressed his cheek against the top of Steve’s head, it left wide, wet streaks on his skin. It didn’t matter.

Bucky began to hear soft groaning and the rustle of grass. He looked up, but he didn’t actually see anything. “Come on, Steve. Let’s get home.” He half-dragged, half-carried Steve back to the car, got him settled and wrapped back up in his jacket, and got back in the driver’s seat to head north towards their house.

Steve didn’t say anything else the whole ride home, just curled in on himself, sobbing and wheezing. Bucky wanted to pull over and do… something. Hug him? Hold him? But the sun was setting fast and they didn’t have any weapons.

They pulled into the garage just as the soft groaning of the nightly migration of zombies began, and Bucky hurried Steve out of the car and into the house, locking the door and shoving the bookcase in front of it for good measure. The generator wasn’t on, so that meant no light and no running water, but they had a barrel of rainwater they kept inside for whenever they needed water and didn’t have the generator. He got Steve onto the sofa and rushed off to find a rag.

Bucky knelt and took Steve’s hands in his. The blood was half-dried now, sticky and tacky. He took the rag, soaked in a bowl of water, and began gently washing it off, being as careful and slow and soft as possible. As he did so, he waited for Steve to protest, to pull his hands away and insist he could do it himself. Steve didn’t. He just watched as the Bucky scrubbed off his fingers and palms, his breathing still raspy and stuttery.

“Stevie?” Bucky whispered. “You with me?”

“I didn’t mean to-” Steve whispered, not looking away from his hands. “I mean, I _did_ , but…”

“I get it.” Bucky promised, pulling the rag away from Steve’s newly cleaned hands. “I’ll get that off your face and you can go change, alright? I’ll find you some clothes in a bit, and tomorrow you can take a shower.” Bucky figured there wasn’t any saving the stuff Steve was wearing; the blood would never come out and he doubted Steve would be okay with wearing them with or without stains, not after this. They didn’t take baths often as a general rule, to preserve water, but Steve would definitely need one.

Bucky plunged the rag into a bowl of fresh, cold water until everything wrung out of it was clear. He knelt back in front of Steve and gently washed his face. Steve’s eyes slid shut and he leaned into the touch. Bucky swallowed hard past the lump in his throat and started pushing out words.

“I’d been in the army for a couple years before the Outbreak, but you remember. There wasn’t a war or anything back then. Nothing big anyone needed to get thrown at. So I’d never killed anyone before then. And for about a year after the Outbreak, I didn’t kill anyone either. Just zombies, and they don’t count, do they?” He could feel Steve’s eyes on him, so he kept his gaze fixed on a spot of blood on Steve’s collar and kept talking, kept wiping away until pale, soft skin remained. “I was part of the 107th. Heard of us? We were supposed to go to the green zone north of here but, uh. We thought it’d be better if we kept moving. Not a lot of well-trained, armed good guys going around the valley, you know?

“Anyway. We’d mainly been dealing with swarms at first. There were so many swarms back then, and settlements didn’t have the numbers or ammo to deal with them, so we’d try to help out where we could. But then a call came in about a bandit group. Real nasty group. Sometimes, bandits just steal things and send people on their way, set up roadblocks and demand bullshit tolls, that’s one thing. But these guys were killing people, killing kids. Rape, murder, cannibalism. It was just a group of people who couldn’t handle the apocalypse. Or maybe they’d always been a stone’s throw from that sort of thing and the apocalypse just give them the opportunity. I don’t know.”

Bucky took a deep breath and had to fight to dredge up memories he’d spent years trying to bury. He felt Steve’s eyes on him, but couldn’t imagine his expression. Steve… Steve was a grouch, but he was so… _good._ He hadn’t killed someone before today, it seemed. Probably hadn’t set fires to piles of dead children. Hadn’t bombed bridges and left refugees stranded. Hadn’t held the hatch of a tank shut and closed his eyes against the screams, the sound of hands banging on the hull and begging to be let in, promising food, money, sex, anything. He’d opened the door for Bucky, dragged him back in, rubbed his back and told him it was going to be okay.

Bucky hadn’t done that for other people. He’d held the hatch closed, pointed his gun at them and told them to hold their hands above their heads and back away, shot them dead when they didn’t comply. Steve was good. Maybe he’d forgive Bucky for not being the same.

“We set up our attack point and let me tell you something, Stevie. I can shoot. I was a mechanic before the Outbreak, but after? I was a sniper. I was one of the best shots they had. And in basic, they teach you to shoot the torso, right? To aim for the chest or whatever. It’s an easier shot. But that don’t work with zombies. It’s a tough habit to break, though.”

Bucky stopped for a moment, swallowing past the sudden lump in his throat and staring at the spot of reddish-brown. Indecision suddenly gripped him and made him stumble over his words, held him back. Steve didn’t say anything, and Bucky suddenly wondered if telling this story was a mistake. What if it made it worse for Steve? What if Steve didn’t want him around afterwards? Bucky wouldn’t blame him. His hand stilled on Steve’s cheek and he finally looked away from the blood spot, down to Steve’s jeans. There was a tear there, with white puffs of frayed thread. He forced the next words out, ignoring how their sharp edges ripped at his throat.

“I broke it pretty quick.”

Bucky paused, expecting Steve to do something. To jerk away in disgust, to slap Bucky’s hand away, push him out of Steve’s space. Steve said nothing, did nothing. Bucky wished he would. He couldn’t bear to look up at Steve’s face and see his expression, and now, he couldn’t _stop._

“Five headshots. Every one was a headshot. They were all dead before they hit the ground. Probably better than they deserved, considering. But, uh. It didn’t hit me. Not really. Not then. Didn’t hit me later either, when I saw them. We went down there to get the people they’d captured and I saw them. Headshots aren’t pretty, but it didn’t hit me then either. Headshots aren’t pretty on zombies either, and I’d seen plenty of them, I guess.”

He hadn’t realized his hand had started shaking until Steve reached up and held it in his own. His hands were bigger than Bucky thought they would be, and warmer. Steve’s thumb was moving, stroking, and Bucky took a few breaths before ploughing on.

“It hit me later. At camp. I barely remember it, to be honest. I was fine for the whole day and then suddenly, I was bawling. I can’t even remember who got me to bed. Probably Dugan. But it didn’t matter that they were bad people, that they deserved it, deserved worse. It was different. And it sticks with you for a long time, you know? You just kind of… learn to live with it, I guess.” Bucky finally looked back up at Steve’s face and met his eyes, big and blue and sad. “Sorry. Guess that wasn’t a-”

“No.” Steve cut him off. “No. Thanks.” Steve smiled a little, and it was just as sad as the whole day had become. It broke Bucky’s heart. He didn’t want to look at it anymore. He wrapped his arms around Steve’s shoulders and tugged him, unresisting, into a hug. Steve buried his face against Bucky’s shoulder, and Bucky rubbed his narrow back, feeling the bones underneath his hand.

“Can you eat?” Bucky asked quietly, knowing the answer to the question. Steve shook his head without a word and Bucky hugged him a little tighter. “That’s fine. You can wear some of my clothes, okay? I’ll grab some. You just… get some sleep, okay?” Steve nodded silently, but didn’t let go. Bucky settled into a more comfortable position and kept rubbing soothing circles into Steve’s back for a little while longer.

“You saved my life, Steve.” Bucky whispered. “I know that might not make a difference, but you did.”

“It does.” Steve said after a pause. His arms tightened around Bucky’s chest. “It does.”

\--

A few hours later, Bucky watched with growing unease as Steve thrashed and whimpered on the couch.

Bucky had gotten some of his clothes and given them to Steve. They were too big, obviously, but they were clean and that was all that mattered. He’d given Steve most of the blankets and settled in with his gun for first watch. Zombies pawed at the door and banged on the windows, but all in all, it seemed like it was going to be a rather dull night.

Until Steve started mumbling.

Bucky couldn’t tell what Steve was saying, but soon, he was yelling and twisting so violently that Bucky crawled over to make sure he didn’t fall off the couch.

“Steve?” Bucky said. “Hey, Steve, it’s okay.” He kept his voice calm and careful. He knew a thing or two about nightmares and wasn’t about to shake Steve senseless trying to wake him up. Steve wasn’t the strongest guy in the world, but Bucky didn’t want to be on the receiving end of a punch from him either. “Steve, wake up. You’re alright.” He reached out and gently put a hand on Steve’s chest. “Steve.”

With a sharp cry, Steve jerked awake, his hand snapping up and grabbing Bucky’s, holding it against his chest. His ragged gasps became louder, harsher, and Bucky twisted his hand and held Steve’s in his own as the breathes started to stick in Steve’s throat.

“Deep breaths, Stevie,” he whispered. “Deep as you can. It’s alright. Just breathe. That’s all you gotta do.” Steve’s hand gripped Bucky’s with crushing force, fingers tangling together as his breaths grew shorter and faster. “Just breathe, buddy. Just breathe. Deep as you can manage. It’s alright, I’m right here.”

Slowly, slowly, Steve’s breathing evened out, deeper and softer. Bucky kept up his murmur of reassurance as Steve began to relax, his death grip on Bucky’s hand loosening and letting blood flow into Bucky’s fingers.

“You okay?” Bucky asked softly. Steve nodded silently. Bucky considered asking Steve what the nightmare was about, but decided against it. Everyone had things that haunted them. If Steve wanted to tell Bucky about it, he would.

Steve’s hand was trembling. Bucky heard his teeth chattering in the dark, and he didn’t know if it was adrenaline or actually the cold autumn night air, but either way…

“You wanna come down here with me, buddy?” Bucky asked softly. Steve froze.

“What?”

“I mean… It’s cold.” Bucky fumbled. “You know. It’s a bit chilly and… I dunno. We could. Get closer. Or something. Might be warmer. If we. Shared blankets. Or something.”

Steve didn’t say anything. Bucky was seriously about five seconds away from saying _“Look, you need a hug, okay?”_ when Steve abruptedly nodded and started gathering up the blankets and sliding off the couch next to Bucky. They tucked the blankets around themselves, and then Bucky shifted his arm around Steve’s shoulders and pulled him close.

Steve felt so _small._ And they’d been around each other long enough for Bucky to know for a fact that Steve would punch Bucky in the throat for ever thinking of him like that, but he was. Small and shivering and still shuddering through every other breath.

Small, but still strong, damn it. Not fragile. Every wheezy breath was almost defiant, as strong as he could make it. The bony shoulders were stiff and tight and tense under Bucky’s hand, as if daring Bucky to pity him.

He was amazing. Stubborn and stupid and gorgeous and brave. And he’d killed for Bucky, and Bucky would kill for him.

On sudden impulse, Bucky leaned down to press a kiss against Steve’s cheek--

Only instead of Steve’s cheek, Bucky felt his lips meet Steve’s lips. Bucky jerked back in shock.

“Sorry,” he gasped out. He couldn’t see Steve’s face in the dark but he could imagine the look, the anger. “Sorry, I’ll-”

“Oh, shut up!” Steve hissed, and suddenly his hands were on Bucky’s shoulders, shoving him down onto his back as Steve straddled him and-

Oh.

_Oh._

Bucky moaned into Steve’s mouth and ran his fingers through Steve’s hair. Steve was an excellent kisser as far as Bucky was concerned: fast and a little sloppy and maybe a bit too much teeth, but god, Steve bit down on Bucky’s lower lip and Bucky gasped and kicked his hips up, grinding and making Steve whine, and Bucky hadn’t felt like this in months. He hadn’t held someone like this in months. He kissed Steve frantically, wrapping an arm around his skinny waist and pulling him closer, _closer._

Bucky pushed himself so that he was sitting again, and Steve was in his lap, his knees on either side of Bucky’s hips, and Bucky felt their erections grind against each other as they shifted positions. Bucky ran his hands up Steve’s back, scratching lightly as he mouthed at Steve’s throat. Steve’s hand was in Bucky’s hair, yanking it and encouraging him lower, and it sent shivers up and down Bucky’s spine, made him moan against Steve’s collarbone and dig his fingernails in a little harder in his shoulderblades.

Bucky slid a hand down Steve’s pants, gripping and stroking at his erection in Bucky’s own over-large jeans, and Steve bit at his shoulder, and if there was still any society to frown on that, Bucky might be vaguely worried about how it would look in the morning but now it’s just good. He was going to walk around their boarded up house with a bite mark on his shoulder for days, and Steve was licking at it and kissing it and Bucky stroked him harder, faster. Steve’s hips began to snap into the grip, and his fingernails cut into Bucky’s skin through the threadbare t-shirt he was wearing.

Steve’s thighs squeezed Bucky’s hips as he came with breathless grunts, clutching at Bucky’s back and tilting his head to let Bucky nip and suck at his throat so they were both marked. Bucky couldn’t see it in the dark but he wanted to, wanted to see the scratches on their backs and the hickeys on their throats. It would have to wait till morning.

Steve slumped in Bucky’s arms, and Bucky leaned back, falling back against the floor with Steve curled up on his chest. His own cock was still hard and achy in his pants, but he didn’t really know what to do about it with Steve sprawled on top of him.

He gasped as Steve shifted and slipped a hand between Bucky’s legs, slow and careful. Bucky bit down hard on his lip and fought to keep himself still. No good getting this worked up and having a zom bust through the door. And that _would_ be his luck.

But nothing of the sort happened. He moaned softly, half-dazed with pleasure as Steve started nuzzling at his throat and jaw, and Bucky wanted to beg him to leave another mark, as many marks as he wanted.

He came so suddenly that he barely had time to throw his arm up and bite down hard on the skin, swallowing his moans as his hips snapped up into Steve’s hand. Force of habit from so many nights after the end, either touching himself or being touched. Another mark for tomorrow, he thought as his hips twitched and rutted, Steve’s fingers wringing the last of his orgasm out of him.

His pants and underwear were ruined, and Steve’s probably were too. But it was too dark, and he was too pleasantly tired to do anything about it. His gun was still within reach and they would hardly sleep through a zombie attack. So he curled his arms around Steve and let himself drift off to sleep

\--

“Bucky. Bucky, you’re smothering me. Wake up.”

Bucky woke up on his stomach, on top of Steve. He scrambled off. The previous night came rushing back to him and he didn’t know what to do next. This was so _different._ “Oh, uh… s-sorry.” He stuttered. Steve sat up with a grin.

“It’s no problem. So. Sleep well?” There was a hint of mischief in Steve’s grin that Bucky wasn’t used to seeing. It threw him off even more, and all he could do was nod stupidly.

Steve stretched luxuriously, and when he tilted his head to stretch his neck, Bucky’s attention was drawn to the plum-purple bruise his own mouth had made. He had to physically stop himself from leaping forward and attaching his mouth to that same spot as the memory of the sounds Steve made came back. He’d been coming when Bucky made that mark. To his horror and mortification, Bucky felt himself get stiff at the memory. He’d wanted to see that mark at the time. Now, he just wanted to melt into the floor, or crawl under the couch and never look Steve in the eye again. “We should check the front. You coming, or do you wanna start breakfast?”

_oh I’ll be coming as soon as you leave the house_

“I’ll get breakfast started.” Bucky said, finally finding his voice again and matching Steve’s light tone easily enough. Steve nodded, that smile still on his face. It suited him, Bucky thought as he and Steve shoved the bookcase out of the way and Steve went outside.

Bucky tugged at his pants uncomfortably, squirming at the slight friction. The come had dried overnight and wasn’t easily ignored, a constant reminder. He wondered if the underwear was salvageable. It’d been a few years since he’d come in his pants. As a general rule, he tried to avoid unnecessarily making his clothing disgusting when there weren’t washing machines. He stumbled into the bathroom and shucked off his pants and underwear. The idea was to try and wash them in the bathroom rain barrel, but he ended up leaning against the wall and gripping himself.

What if Steve heard? Well, technically he already had, but this would be about five million times more embarrassing. He bit down on his lip and closed his eyes, stroking himself slowly. There were better ways to deal with this. Just jump in the fucking rain barrel. Just let himself get soft. So many better options than jerking off in the bathroom.

He remembered the hickey on Steve’s throat, how it was shaped like Bucky’s own mouth, and began to stroke faster, the tiny bathroom filling with his open-mouthed moans.

He could make another, if Steve let him. On the other side of Steve’s throat. The previous night had been so frantic and fast, but Bucky could take it slow. Take Steve apart, make him writhe. Map out every inch with his hands, find every scar and freckle and jutting bone and kiss them all.

Bucky’s free hand slammed against the cracked tile wall as his hips began to jerk into his fist. He whined desperately and twisted his hand, stroking and rubbing his thumb over the slit.

He imagined Steve’s hand jerking him off, those long fingers wrapping around his cock, and fell apart.

After washing himself off and plunging his underwear into some water he peered out of the bathroom, listening for any sign that Steve had heard him. There was nothing. With a sigh of relief, he went to the cabinets and eyed the cans stacked inside. Not exactly the stuff he’d make for someone the morning after… He picked a can at random and ended up making chicken soup.

Steve came back in with blood on his - Bucky’s - shirt, a little pale and grimacing.

“I couldn’t find my ax,” he explained. “Had to improvise. Haven’t used rocks in a long time.” Bucky cringed. Rocks were messy as hell.

“Yeah, I forgot them in the store yesterday. I don’t have my shovel either.” Bucky explained as Steve grabbed a spoon and dug into the soup. “We could go back and get them if-”

“No.” Steve said quickly. “No. That’s. I’ll find something else.” Bucky nodded as Steve looked away and went back to soup more slowly. Right. Going back to get them would mean going back to town. To the jewelry store. To Hillary and that whole mess.

Suddenly, Bucky’s stomach heaved dangerously. Yesterday. Steve had killed someone _yesterday_. And it had been horrible, he’d been a wreck. He’d had nightmares.

And then Bucky’d fucked him.

Well. That wasn’t accurate. But they’d kissed. Gotten off. Hours after Steve had thrown up next to the road and sobbed himself hoarse in Bucky’s arms. Hours after Bucky had washed blood off his hands and face because Steve was too shell-shocked to do it himself.

What kind of sick fuck does stuff with someone who was traumatized hours before?

“Bucky?” Steve said. “You okay?” Bucky looked up and saw concern on Steve’s face, in his eyes. He’d looked so broken yesterday, so sick with himself.

Bucky nodded mechanically.

“Yeah.” He managed. “I’m fine. You? Are you. How’re you feeling?” He hoped that was vague enough to pass, but evidently it wasn’t. Steve stiffened and looked away.

“Okay.” He said, then added, “Better,” which was a more descriptive answer than Bucky’d been expecting. “I’m better.” He jerked his head towards the door and smiled again. He was smiling a lot today, which Bucky thought was… weird. It didn’t even seem forced. “I’ll be even better if we manage to get anything done today, which we won’t if you don’t get up and get moving.”

Steve didn’t talk too much the rest of the day, but he smiled a lot. Smiled at Bucky. Smiled at trees, at squirrels, at a stray cat that passed by and hissed at him when he tried to pet it. It was… weird. Bucky couldn’t tell if it was normal. He didn’t think it was. It definitely wasn’t normal for Steve to be this… happy. Which wasn’t a very nice thought to have, but it was true. Steve was a bit of a grouch, normally.

Bucky, by contrast, couldn’t stop thinking. He shouldn’t have kissed Steve. Yeah, it was an accident, but he shouldn’t have kissed back later. He shouldn’t have. Steve wasn’t thinking clearly, he’d just woken up from a nightmare, he’d just _killed someone_. Bucky certainly hadn’t been in any place to sleep with anyone after he first killed someone.

Bucky had to swallow back bile more than a few times as the sun rose high and started to fall. He took advantage. And Steve was gonna realize that and be angry and kick him out. And rightfully so.

He should apologize. He would apologize. He’d explain himself and hope Steve understood and forgave and they could pretend it never happened and keep being friends.

He spent the rest of the day after the decision formulating his plan. ‘I’m sorry’ was probably a good place to start, he reasoned as he helped Steve reinforce the garage windows. Yeah, ‘I’m sorry’ was good, he decided as he and Steve foraged for food. And then he’d explain why, show he understood what he did was wrong. Because it was wrong, he thought, glaring into his dinner. And then-

“Bucky?” Steve interrupted. “Are you okay?”

“What?” Bucky asked through a mouthful of beans, startled. Steve was looking at him quizzically.

“Well, you’ve been really quiet today,” he said. “Usually you never shut up.” He said it jokingly, and when Bucky didn’t respond, he repeated, “Are you okay?”

_‘I’m sorry’ is a good place to start._

“We shouldn’t have-” Bucky started, but that wasn’t right. “I shouldn’t have done that. Last night.” Steve froze, staring at Bucky for a moment.

“What?” He said, and Bucky couldn’t begin to figure out the emotion in his voice so he ploughed on.

“It wasn’t right. I shouldn’t have. You’d… had a nightmare and before that… I shouldn’t have taken advantage. I mean, I wanted to, I really wanted to, and I wasn’t trying to kiss you but you turned your head a-and it just sort of happened and then, um…” Bucky licked his lips and felt the bruise on his throat like a brand, felt the scratches on his back sting and burn. “I’m sorry.” He finished lamely, not feeling like he’d made his point correctly or at all.

Steve was staring at him with an expression so complicated that Bucky couldn’t figure it out, and he started to mentally prepare himself for the possibility that he was going to get kicked out.

“Why on earth would you apologize for that?” Steve asked, sounding absolutely baffled. Bucky blinked, confused by the question.

“B-because? You’d just had a… well, a pretty awful day. To say the least. Traumatic day. And I should have… had more control.” Bucky squirmed under Steve’s gaze.

“I kissed you back.” Steve pointed out. Bucky opened his mouth, then shut it again, unable to think of a response to that that would be accepted or responded to with anything other than anger or offense. “Hell, I did more than that.” Bucky swallowed hard at the memory and firmly refused to get hard because of it. “I wanted it, Bucky, okay?” Steve met Bucky’s gaze frankly, and Bucky honestly didn’t know what to say to that. He’d expected… well, he didn’t exactly know. Not this though. “And I still want it. I want _you._ ”

“I shouldn’t have.” Bucky protested, feeling increasingly stupid. Steve scowled.

“And what? You think I didn’t have any control over the situation? Would you have just kept going if I’d told you to stop?” Steve asked before Bucky could answer the first question. Bucky recoiled, horrified.

“God, no! But-”

“But nothing.” Steve said firmly. “I. Wanted. It. Bucky. And I still do. Yeah, yesterday was… hard. But you helped, okay? I needed you and you helped me.” Bucky didn’t know what to say. He looked down at his hands, unable to meet Steve’s eyes and swinging back and forth between feeling totally relieved and utterly stupid. Then Steve took Bucky’s hand in his own, and Bucky looked up again.

“We can stop.” Steve said. “If you want to. If you don’t want to keep going, we don’t have to. But I _do_ want to. And it _is_ getting chilly at night, isn’t it?” Bucky snorted softly and Steve grinned again, and it was gorgeous. Amazing. Bucky wanted it to be like that all the time. He wanted Steve to be happy all the time.

“Okay.” He said, squeezing Steve’s hand a little. “Since it’s getting cold.”

“Right.”

“And you’re scrawny.”

“Wow, what a great strategy for getting in my pants.” Steve said. “Insults.” Bucky laughed and hesitantly leaned forward, nuzzling against Steve’s throat and sucking on that bruise. That lovely bruise he’d made that he was going to make sure never faded.

\--

The next day, Bucky was pleasantly achy and his pants were in an even worse state than before, but he knew for a fact that Steve was no better off. He’d woken up wrapped around Steve like an octopus, trapping him in a cage of warm limbs that Steve seemed more than happy to snuggle into. They had made plans to go into town the next day to look for new zom-killing weapons and continue their preparations for the visit to the trader’s camp, agreeing without any discussion about it to avoid the strip mall and the jewelry store. Bucky might go back to get his bag, but he would do so on his own, without taking Steve. Bucky could barely stomach the thought of going; he couldn’t imagine dragging Steve there.

As Steve set about repairing a shirt he’d scavenged at the Dressbarn, Bucky got ready to go out and do his own chores.

“Alright, I’m off.” Bucky shrugged the gun into his shoulder and checked everything. Knife, extra ammo, rope… “I’ll be back in a bit, okay? Just gonna check the snares.”

“You got it.” Steve replied, not looking up from the shirt. Bucky hesitated, scuffing the floor with his boot. Steve looked up quizzically. “What?”

Before he could chicken out, Bucky hurried over, knelt next to Steve, and pressed a kiss against his cheek. Steve stared at him long enough for Bucky to start panicking a little, then smiled a rather dopey smile and leaned forward and up, kissing Bucky back.

“Sap.” He said affectionately. “Go on.”

Bucky didn’t stop grinning for hours.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> REMEMBER WHEN I SAID I'D TRY TO BE LESS LATE? YEAH, THAT DIDN'T HAPPEN.
> 
> Well, here's the dealio. I'm being shipped off to Lackland Air Force Base in November, so I'm going to try to get to a certain point in the story by that point, and then there's going to be a break between November and sometime in January. I'm really sorry about the delay and the impending hiatus, but I hope the porn makes up for it.


	4. Hiatus

I'd like to apologize. I said I was going to post twice more before today and I failed to do so. I'm going to be in Airforce Basic Training until early to mid January, so Stand By Me will continue then. I love all of you, and I hope that you'll continue to be as patient as you have been! 

I'll see you in January!


End file.
